Wolverhampton Wanderers and Napoli showed serious interest in Sevilla’s Juanlu Sánchez in the summer, but neither were able to secure his services.
El Desmarque have had a chat with the right-back to discuss his failure to move to the Premier League/Serie A this summer.
Napoli were courting him for most of the window and their inability to find a quick agreement with Sevilla then allowed Wolves to enter the picture. Vítor Pereira’s side made some progress by agreeing terms with the Andalusian club.
On August 6th, AS reported Wolves were the only club to have come close to reaching the €20m price set by Sevilla. Wolves and tried to convince the Spaniard after reaching an agreement with his club.
Later that day, Estadio Deportivo reported the Andalusian club put pressure on Juanlu to accept a move to Molineux as Wolves’ offer was higher than the €15m proposed by the Serie A winners.
The 22-year-old didn’t succumb to the pressure as he wasn’t keen on moving to England, while a move to Napoli never materialised.
El Desmarque haven’t specifically mentioned Wolves and the Naples club. They say clubs from England and Italy made moves and asked the player whether it was a ‘missed opportunity or special motivation’.
Responding to that, he said: “All those things are motivations because they are nice things that happen, but my biggest motivation right now is to be here.
“I think there are few places where I could grow more than here, at home, with a manager like Matías, with his approach to the game, which I think benefits players like us who can be a bit more offensive. This is the best place to grow right now.”
The fullback added that at one point he was prepared to leave to help Sevilla improve their finances.
“It’s not that I saw myself leaving, but I was prepared in case anything happened, and I had to help Sevilla, because I was going to be ready,” Juanlu explained.
“But just as I was prepared in case, I had to give my all here with the No.16, and that’s what happened. They’ve given me this wonderful opportunity to defend the ’16’, which is the most important thing for me.”
